THE FOOL OF QUALITY;

OR THE

HISTORY OF HENRY EARL OF MORELAND.

CHAPTER I.

WHEN I look back, my fair cousin, on the passages of my life, it is a matter of amazement to me, that a creature so frail, so feebly and so delicately constituted as man, with nerves so apt to be racked, and a heart to be wrung with anguish, can possibly endure under the weights of calamity that at times are laid upon him.

I had not yet dropped a tear. I was in a state of half stupid and half flighty insensibility; as one who, having lost every thing, had nothing further to look for, and therefore nothing to regard. But when I saw my dear old man, my best friend, my father, whelmed under such a depth of affliction, all the sluices of my soul and inmost affections were laid open, and I broke into an avowed passion of tears and exclamations, till, like David in his strife of love with Jonathan, I exceeded. I accused myself of all the evils that had happened to his house; and I devoted the day to dark

ness, and the night to desolation, wherein, by my presence and connections, I had brought those mischiefs upon him. The good man was greatly struck, and I think partly consoled, by the excess of my sorrows; and, all desolate as he was, he attempted to administer that comfort to me, which he himself wanted more than any who had life.

Break not your heart, my Harry-break not your heart, my child! he cried. Deprive me not of the only consolation that is left me; you are now my only trust, my only stay upon earth. A wretched merchant I am, whose whole wealth is cast away, save thee, thou precious casket, thou only remnant of all my possessions! My girl, indeed, was thy true lover, the tenderest of all mates; her love to thee, my son, was passing the love of woman; but we have lost her, we have lost her, and wailing is all the portion that is left us below.

As soon as the family heard the voice of our mourning, they too gave a loose to the impatience of their griefs, and all the house was filled with the sound of lamentation.

On the following day I summoned the chief medical artists, and got the precious remains of my angel embalmed. She was laid under a sumptuous canopy with a silver coffin at her bed's foot, and every night when the house was at rest I stole secretly from my bed and stretched myself beside her. I pressed her cold lips to mine; I clasped her corpse to my warm bosom, as though I expected to restore it to life by transfusing my soul into it. I spoke to her as when living; I reminded her of the several tender and endearing passages of our loves; and I reminded her also of the loss of our little ones, by whom we became essentially one, inseparably united in soul and body for ever.

There is surely, my cousin, a species of pleasure in grief, a kind of soothing and deep delight, that arises with the tears which are pushed from the fountain of God in the soul,

from the charities and sensibilities of the human heart divine.

True, true, my precious cousin, replied the countess, giving a fresh loose to her tears. O Matilda! I would I were with thee!-True my cousin, I say; even now I sink under the weight of the sentiment of your story.

Upon the ninth night, continued Mr. Clinton, as I lay by the side of all that remained of my Matty, overtoiled and overwatched, I fell into a deep sleep. My mind notwithstanding, at the time, seemed more awake and more alive to objects than ever. In an instant she stood visible and confessed before me. I saw her clearer than at noonday, by the light which she cast with profusion abroad. Every feature and former trace seemed heightened into a lustre, without a loss of the least similitude. She smiled ineffable sweetness and blessedness upon me: and, stooping down, I felt her embrace about my heart and about my spirit; while, at the same time, I saw her bent in complacence before me. After a length of ecstatic pleasure, which I felt from her communion and infusion into my soul-My Harry, says she, grieve not for me! All the delights that your world could sum up in an age, would not amount to my bliss, no, not for an hour: it is a weight of enjoyment that, in an instant, would crush to nothing the whole frame of your mortality. Grieve not then for me, my Harry, but resign my beggarly spoils to their beggarly parent; ashes to ashes, and dust to dust! In my inordinate fondness for you, I have at length obtained a promise that my master and your master, my beloved and your lover, shall finally bear you triumphant through all the enemies that are set in fearful array against you. Having so said, I felt myself, as it were, compressed within an engine of love; and again, losing the remembrance of all that had passed, I sunk as into a state of oblivion. Towards the dawning, I was awakened by the clapping of

hands and cries of lamentation. Starting up, I perceived Mr. Golding at the bedside, suspended over his Matty and me, and pouring forth his complaints.

There was a favoured domestic of his, a little old man, who had always kept a careful and inquisitive eye over every thing that was in or concerned our household. This Argus, it seems, at length suspected my nightly visits to the dead, and, lurking in a corner, saw me open and enter the chamber where the corpse was deposited. As he lay in his master's apartment, he took the first opportunity of his being awake to impart what he thought a matter of extraordinary intelligence to him.-Sir, says he, if I am not greatly deceived, my young master is this moment in bed with his dead lady.What is this you tell me? cried Mr. Golding. No, John, no! what you say is impossible. All who live, love that which is living alone; whatever savours of death is detestable to all men.-As I am here, replied John, I am almost assured that what I tell you is fact.-Peace, peace, you old fool! said Mr. Golding; think you that our Harry is more loving than father Abraham, and yet Abraham desired to bury his dead out of his sight. I know not how that may be, said trusty John, but, if you are able to stir, I will help you to go and see. I am sure the thought of it melts the very heart within me.

Accordingly Mr. Golding, like old Jacob, strengthened himself, and arose, and, pained as he was, he came with the help of his John to the place where I lay.

Having for some time looked upon me, as I slept with his Matty fast folded in my arms, he could no longer contain his emotions, but he and John broke forth into tears and exclamations. O, my children, my children, my dearest children! he cried; why did ye exalt me to such a pitch of blessedness? Was it only to cast me down into the deeper gulf of misery-a gulf that has neither bank nor bottom?

As I arose, all ashamed to be detected in that manner, the good man caught me in his arms.—My Harry, my Harry, says he, what shall I pay you, my son, for your superabundant love to me and to mine? Could my wretchedness give you bliss, I should almost think myself blessed in being wretched, my Harry.

I now prepared to execute the late command of my angel, and to consign to earth the little that was earthly in her. But when our domestics understood that all that was left of their loved mistress was now going to be taken away from them for ever, they broke into tears anew, and set no bounds to their lamentations.

Her desolate father was desirous of attending the funeral, but on my knees I dissuaded him from it, as I was assured it would burst in twain the already overstretched thread of his age and infirmities. He then insisted on having the lid of the coffin removed, and, bending over, he cast his old body on the corpse; again he rose and gazed upon it, and clapping his hands, with a shout-Is this my world, he cried; the whole of my possessions? Are you the one that was once my little prattling Matty-the playfellow of my knees-the laugher away of care-who brought cheer to my heart and warmth to my bosom? Are you the one for whom alone I spent my nights in thought and my days in application? Is this all that is left, then, of my length of labours? O, my spark of life is quenched in thee, my Matty, my Matty! the flowing fountain of my existence is dried up for ever!

There is something exceedingly solemn and affecting, my cousin, in the circumstances and apparatus of our funerals; they are oppressive even to minds that are no way concerned or interested in the death of the party lamented. Though I grieved no more for my Matty-though I was as assured of her bliss as I was of my own being; yet, when the gloom of the procession was gathered around me when I heard the